Validation of the Turkish version of the Neurological Fatigue Index for Stroke

ABSTRACT

Introduction

Post-stroke fatigue is an often overlooked problem that hinders recovery. Therefore, stroke patients should be evaluated for fatigue during the recovery period. This study aimed to adapt the Neurological Fatigue Index for Stroke (NFI-Stroke) into the Turkish language.

Methods

This methodological study was carried out on 110 stroke patients admitted to a university hospital in Istanbul. In addition to the NFI-Stroke, Functional Independence Measure, National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale, modified-Rankin Scale, Fatigue Severity-Scale, and Stroke Self Efficacy Questionnaire were used to collect data.

Results

Since the linguistic validity study of the scale has already been carried out, only psychometric properties were evaluated. The items in the scale were grouped under two factors. The Cronbach`s alpha coefficient was found to be 0.96 for the physical sub-dimension and 0.84 for the cognitive sub-dimension. Item-total correlation coefficients were found between 0.74-0.91 for the physical sub-dimension, and 0.82-0.91 for the cognitive sub-dimension. The test-retest evaluation confirmed the consistency of the responses to the scale against time. The scale was correlated with other scales used in the study as expected.

Conclusions

The NFI-Stroke will be useful in clinical practice in assessment of fatigue, which may affect the adaptation of patients to rehabilitation.

KEYWORDS:

• Stroke
• fatigue
• validity
• reliability
• psychometric

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

Ethics approval statement

Before starting the study, permission to use the scale was obtained from the researchers who developed the NFI-Stroke. Ethical approval was obtained from the Istanbul University-Cerrahpasa Ethics Committee (Number: E-74555795-050.01.04-232792, Date: 03.11.2021). Written informed consent was obtained from the patients participating in the study.

Meeting presentation

This study was presented at the Neurology Nursing Course arranged by the collaboration of Turkish Neurological Society and Association of Neurological Nursing (14-16 October, 2022)